trot

noun

1. A gait of a person or animal faster than a walk but slower than a run.

   “Waziri’s warriors marched at a rapid trot through the jungle in the direction of the village.”

2. A brisk journey or progression.

   “We often take the car and have a trot down to the beach.”

   “In this lesson we'll have a quick trot through Chapter 3 before moving on to Chapter 4.”

3. A gait of a four-legged animal between walk and canter, a diagonal gait (in which diagonally opposite pairs of legs move together).

   “Dogs have a variety of gaits. Most dogs have the walk, trot, pace, and gallop.”

   “The toelt is comfortable for the rider because the amplitude of the dorsoventral displacement is lower than at the trot.[…]The slow trot is a two-beat symmetric diagonal gait. Among the normal variations of the trot of saddle horses, the speed of the gait increases from collected to extended trot.”

   “To assume the correct position for the posting trot, first walk, with the body inclined forward in a posting position. Then put the horse into a slow or sitting trot at six miles an hour. Do not post.”

4. A toddler.

   “1855, William Makepeace Thackeray, The Newcomes, 1869, The Works of William Makepeace Thackeray, Volume V: The Newcomes, Volume I, page 123, […] but Ethel romped with the little children — the rosy little trots — and took them on her knees, and told them a thousand stories.”

5. A moderately rapid dance.
6. (obsolete)A young animal.
7. (archaic, derogatory)An ugly old woman, a hag.
8. (Australia, obsolete)A succession of heads thrown in a game of two-up.
9. (Australia, New-Zealand)A run of luck or fortune.

   “He′s had a good trot, but his luck will end soon.”

   “It was to be a hugely special occasion, for apart from the picture shows at the Majestic, there was usually nothing at all going on in Sandspit to make anyone think they were on a good trot living there.”

   “Should he or she be having a bad trot, the exchange rate will be higher than normal.”

10. (dated, slang)Synonym of horse (illegitimate study aid)
11. (informal)Diarrhoea.

    “He's got a bad case of the trots and has to keep running off to the toilet.”

12. (uncountable)A genre of Korean pop music employing repetitive rhythm and vocal inflections.
13. (alt-of, alternative)Alternative form of Trot (“Trotskyist”).

    “The problem is that the likes of Shapps and his boss Boris Johnson are eager for a fight with the unions. They are being deliberately provocative, so they can portray railway workers as 'troublesome trots'.”

14. (derogatory, slang)A Trotskyite.

    “Loyal to a tee, he is still at a loss to understand the failure of the Frank Dobson candidacy in the London mayoral contest, and abandoned constituency meetings after a couple of events because they were "too dominated by Trots".”

    “We believed that the Trots represented a mad, extreme form of Labour that was never going to do anything for anybody, yet we felt strongly that nothing would be achieved by jumping ship and defecting to the SDP.”

verb

1. (intransitive)To move along briskly; specifically, to move at a pace between a walk and a run.

   “I didn't want to miss my bus, so I trotted the last few hundred yards to the stop.”

   “The dog trotted along obediently by his master's side.”

   “I would trot ten or twelve miles each day, go into a cheap restaurant and eat my fill of bread, but would never be satisfied. During these wanderings I once hit on a vegetarian restaurant in Farringdon Street. The sight of it filled me with the same joy that a child feels on getting a thing after its own heart.”

   “They sent little Jane to the garden to play, But she opened the gate, and then trotted away Under the hawthorns and down the green lane, Bad little, mad little, runaway Jane!”

   “It was earliest morning, when even small trees cast long shadows and scarlet foxes trot denward through the dew like flecks of fire.”

2. (intransitive)To move at a gait between a walk and a canter.
3. (transitive)To cause to move, as a horse or other animal, in the pace called a trot; to cause to run without galloping or cantering.
4. (UK, archaic, slang, transitive)To bid against (a person) at an auction, so as to raise the price of the goods.

   “A particular friend of mine complained that I had "trotted" him at a sale, but he did not see what was happening on the part of the other bidder.”